Can Jessica Simpson's New Baby Make Her a Ton of Cash?

How much will Jessica Simpson make off her pregnancy and recent birth?—Doughboy, via the inbox

If there's one thing Jessica Simpson knows how to do, it's make money out of stuff that other people do all the time, like, getting married. Or, in this most recent case, making a newborn baby girl named Maxwell Drew Johnson.

First of all, there's no guarantee she'll make half as much as reproducing stars of yore; the days of People magazine paying up to $15 million for the first shot of Knox and Vivienne are long gone.

"They were the last" of the celebrities to fetch that kind of cash for a baby photo, confirms Cooper Lawrence, author of The Cult of Celebrity and cohost of the new podcastLoose Talk. "That ship has sailed."

And remember: Jessica allegedly tried to sell confirmation of her pregnancy, plus first baby photos, for a reported $750,000, but failed. (Instead we got a free photo of her as a "mummy." Get it. Get it?)

Plus, Simpson already has a huge fashion empire, which started with shoes but has since grown to roughly two dozen separate licenses, including stuff for tweens, plus-sized women...and soon-to-be-moms.

Simpson's recent pregnancy should only boost sales in that last category.

And finally, there are still those baby photos to sell.

When at first you don't succeed, try, try again, and that's reportedly what Simpson is doing. According to sources who have spoken to my hard-driving reporter colleagues here at E!, Simpson may soon have a deal for the first baby photos—and it could be for $750,000 or more.

"That's a lot of money for people like us," Lawrence tells this B!tch. "But it's not a lot of money for a celebrity baby photo."